Dr. Darren Staloff, Hume's Theory of Morality

[@DevelopmentofAvoid]

0:00 Introduction (precursor to Nietzsche) 3:51 The cause of moral judgment 6:00 Sentiment of approbation 8:26 The scale of morality 9:37 Utility of the community 10:22 benevolence 12:19 Super abundance 13:20 Selfless society 15:34 Super scarcity 18:00 Taking advantage of the weak 21:01 Moral progress through poetry 23:35 Utility of government 25:25 Understanding the need for utility 29:46 The problem of ultimate consequences 32:27 Judging good by its final result 33:48 The problem of calculating 35:00 Inherent good 36:04 What counts is the consequences 38:10 "herd instinct" 40:46 Satisfying the animal in us

[@JulioLopez-xz5kx]

Amazing!

[@svalbard01]

I like the interviews with present day, retired Dr. Sugrue. Can we also get some interviews with present day Dr. Staloff? That would be awesome! Edit: Or even have them both on at the same time to discuss a topic!!

[@SakutoNoSAI]

Dr. Staloff is actually still active and producing. He's worth a search on youtube. I Saw a discussion on American Constitutionalism with him.

[@TravelingPhilosopher]

@@SakutoNoSAI Would you please share the link? :) Nvm I found it! kzbin.info/www/bejne/pJrPnIuwg7uSrKM

[@kaimarmalade9660]

You got your wish!

[@blurredlenzpictures3251]

May your wish be granted.

[@enlightenedanalysis]

Very enjoyable and educational. Thank you Dr. Stalloff.

[@username1235400]

This channel is treasure. Thank you !!

[@andrewpelham4906]

This man is the most elegant communicator of modern philosophy I've ever had the opportunity to experience

[@theponderingplumb9790]

Are all philosophy professors this eloquent and accessible? Between my university general Ed philosophy course and Drs. Staloff and Sugrue, I feel so lucky to listen to them!

[@pearz420]

no

[@rockycomet4587]

My ponytail sweetheart.

[@marcokite]

.....swoon

[@libertykraft6646]

Obsessed with you two

[@bishop7954]

I'm hoping theres hundreds of these lectures you both will continue to upload. Both powerful & excellent in it's presentation for the average thinker to digest.

[@erickomar3152]

Post something about Hegel next! Much love, Professors Sugrue and Staloff, even if you don't! 💕💞

[@christianhughes1567]

I was about to read but now I have to watch lol.

[@DevelopmentofAvoid]

Same

[@mileskeller5244]

I love it when I get that warm feeling in my pancreas 🤣

[@JollySkeptic]

Kant watch this video enough. Good stuff.

[@arthurfleming1478]

Thank You, Good presentation. I like Hume for his view regarding morality.

[@kennethobrien8386]

Thank you for posting!

[@aagamjain1395]

I wish all philosophers were like you

[@jasonavant7470]

So concise: "We only treat people with justice when it conduces to utility to the public good of our community."

[@muhammadasifkhan4198]

Beautifully presented

[@robinsarchiz]

What if the reason we switch between consequentialist ethics and final causality ethics is because we value intentions in a consequentialist manner? Say a friend says he’s going to help you move. And then he calls you the same day and says ”Sorry man, my daughter is sick, I’m at the hospital and can’t help you today.”, and you forgive him. But isn’t the reason that he’s displayed a willingness to be charitable in the future? In other words, aren’t you simply valuing the future prospect of a reciprocal friendship? Say a perdon kills someone with a car by accident and he gets acquitted. Don’t we let him off the hook because he’s not likely to cause more harm than good in society? And say someone is a person unwilling to harm others, as a matter of fact he has the best intentions for people, he’s a doctor. But a bad one. Do we let him continue his practice? No.

[@jasonrose6288]

Can't it also be backwards looking in the sense that people are running down previously accumulated goodwill?

[@robinsarchiz]

@@jasonrose6288 I'm not sure what you mean. Could you elaborate?

[@jasonrose6288]

@@robinsarchiz It seemed you are suggesting people give each other ethical leeway based on an expectation of future virtuous action. I was wondering if it's more a case of rewarding people for past ethical performance. In other words, if someone promises to help me and then reneges, I'll excuse it if they have previously built up goodwill with me. There doesn't need to be any expectation of a future reward in that.

[@robinsarchiz]

@@jasonrose6288 That seems to be consistent with my argument. If whether you forgive the reneger is dependent on whether they have previously built up goodwill with you, then you are rewarding behaviour that is beneficial to you by giving them more charitable treatment in a rare case where they do you some ill. And the reason for rewards is to facilitate more such behaviour in the future.

[@pearz420]

"And say someone is a person unwilling to harm others, as a matter of fact he has the best intentions for people, he’s a doctor. But a bad one. Do we let him continue his practice?" Yes. This is where theorizing gets flattened by reality.

[@helpconflict9851]

Great lecture

[@stevenyourke7901]

I wish David Hume and Emmanuel Kant could have met and had a conversation.

[@libertykraft6646]

I wish they could have had a kickboxing match

[@sfdrexj7185]

I have watched Prof. Sugrue's lecture on Aquinas (in 2023) before watching this. It is interesting. I wonder what Humean morality will say to Nuremberg. I had quite some thoughts.

[@noor5x9]

Hume suggests that we can expand our ethical sensibilities beyond considering just those individuals who are in our interest to consider through poetry and literature. This, however, must mean that not all are ethical judgements are the consequence of our self-interest or utility as Hume defines it, which is in contradiction with his original thesis. I, however, would say that beyond our instinct to self-interest, we also instinctively want to care for other people in and of itself. Education does not construct this care for others, but merely recovers it. The reason men of those times did not care for women or Indians is that they were estranged from their innate sensibilities through the workings of society, and the fact that reading poetry or literature can reawaken our care for these people proves this. We are not a cruel and self-interested species as Hobbes would have us believe. In fact, the only reason for the popularity of Hobbesianisms or the Christian doctrine of original sin, is that it allows people in power to justify themselves. To say that, since human beings are evil, we need a Leviathan or king to control their debased impulses. To say that humans are evil is not to be more rational than "naïve optimists", it is to align yourself with the ideological framework of authoritarianism.

[@wowthatsalowprice8942]

@J J I agree with J J-- I recollect having the impulse to manipulate and bully other children as early as 4, an impulse which I observed in my peers. I indulged this impulse uncritically throughout my childhood, for at some level I assumed this was the only way to safely navigate the social landscape. It was only until my teen years when it began to dawn on me that inflicting pain on others also invited pain onto myself. Eventually this concretised into the revelation that in order to act self-interestedly, one must act cooperatively. The only people who mistake self-interest and cruelty as synonymous are those who misunderstand what is in their interest-- those who are either young, ignorant, or deceived. In my view, acting in one's perceived self-interest is the only constant in human behavior. That one's self interest can be interpreted interchangeably as cruelty or altruism implies we have an innate and inherent capacity for both. Speaking as someone who shares your distaste for authoritarianism, it matters not whether you are structuring your metaethical framework in favor of or in opposition to it-- both methods are equally moralistic, and it's difficult to arrive at an objective metaethical view when thinking in moralistic terms.

[@Tuber-sama]

@J J We have a natural tendency for dehumanizing anyone who is not from our "tribe" (fear of the unknown). Contributing to your thesis, I think that literature can help us understand other social groups, and then show our natural appreciation towards the things we know (in this case, people). It's useful because they are humans now, not some alien "thing" that we can exploit.

[@vincentmalloy8423]

reading poetry and literature to understand other cultures/peoples could still be for utility. i think poetry and literature are effective ways to understand people but not necessary.

[@joshyman221]

@@Tuber-sama I would argue that this natural tendency to empathize with others once we recognize ourselves within them is the “natural” part. I don’t think it’s inherently natural to a priori recognize ourselves within them, and this is where the arts do an incredible job of increasing this empathy. The utilitarianism that follows is very natural. And so in this sense, moral progress arises from learning how to expand this moral sphere. It doesn’t have to be useful to you at all, though I think evolutionary this is where the natural feeling comes from. I think animal welfare is a good example of this. One can empathize for an animal and we see this as virtuous, not because the animal can return this kindness (although indeed they can if they are pets for example), but because we recognise some semblance of ourselves inside them (albeit not fully human self). And one can tell who does and who doesn’t empathize with animals almost always from their experience with them. Listening to a bird song, for example, has a similar effect to reading a poem.

[@Bowaaaaaaa]

Where can i find this in Humes work in which volume? If you don't mind.

[@stevenmoore7272]

“…we’re not that smart of a species, don’t flatter yourself…” Ah, thank you Dr. Stallof, I had almost forgotten 😔

[@slottibarfast5402]

What is lacking in discussions of morality is outcomes. The most wonderful system of morality is judged on outcomes which are not completely dependable. That medicine I take for my headache might be toxic to you. Do on to others as you would have others do on to you while on the surface seems moral is often terrible in practice because it is not true that my experience is reflected in others. Our understanding of what is good for us is not complete and even less so of others. The best set of ethics with a very high prediction of outcomes is still at the mercy of imperfect understandings of the situation in which we make judgements and take actions.

[@johansigg3869]

21:44 I remember hating the movie Dances With Wolves so much

[@samhblackmore]

I'm slightly confused about the chronology of topics. I see from a quick search that Hume lived until 1776 so he was around about 100 years earlier than the Origin of Species (1859) and even longer before the First World War. So I'm guessing when the professor mentions evolution (unless I'm misremembering) and WW1 it's in a hypothetical sense of what Hume would have thought. In any case, I thoroughly enjoyed the lecture! It reminded me a lot of The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins which explains how evolution could actually favour a "gene" (oversimplification) for altruism. Even though altruism may not directly benefit the individual or help their own genes to survive. With that in mind, it doesn't seem like much of a stretch to say that our sense of morals (the warm fuzzy feeling described by the professor) evolved through gene selection as it helps our society in the utilitarian view of Hume (except Hume presumably wasn't aware of the theory of evolution)

[@truthisaquestion]

In constructing the apparati of morality, we are always lead to a paradox. I would suggest Plato intended the reader to use reason to align oneself with the good rather than to decide what goodness is. I think we all recognize the difficulty in defining benevolence (for example) as having utility in the domain of the communal good. It seems the difference between good and evil is grasped immediately (a priori). Knowledge of what is good, seems to imply some kind of prescience, such that we could not know if something is good unless we knew also how it "plays out" in the long run. Of course, "the long run" can go on forever. This is what ties goodness with our concept of eternality. That is, what is good, must be eternally good ... or something like that. I would suggest, as others have done, that morality is a constant, or some kind of (to borrow from Chalmers) some kind of psycho-physical law. We sense its force (in the psyche) and convert/manifest that "energy" into action. We might then say that good and evil are poles that generate a field of morality much like an electromagnetic field. ... I know its out there, but its just a thought.

[@MMG-q1v]

I don’t think a person “ knows” much about priori. But many (most) of the persons living at any time are likely to be descended from people whose natural inclinations happened to support the development and continuance of a moral society. Those persons with anti-social instincts and behaviors had fewer grandchildren than those with pro-social instincts and behaviors. I think it is conceivable that the effect was amplified during the era of rapid cognitive development in the talking ape population. And here we are, overpopulating our habitat.

[@truthisaquestion]

@@MMG-q1v your analysis still begs the question of what is good. Choosing a mate still requires a judgement and there is no evidence to to support your story. I could invent an equally plausible story in which forced encounters were the primary method of procreation. The Earth is not overpopulated. There is more than enough food and space for everyone.

[@MMG-q1v]

@@truthisaquestion By “everyone,” do you mean “humans”?

[@henryburby6077]

6:59. This idea abaolutely applies, for the most part, to large criminal organizations, but pirate captains and officers were elected, historically, the reason being that a tyranical captain would be utterly at the mercy of his crew. Lacking the institutional power which would jump to defend or avenge a merchant or naval captain (or a loyal mafia sub boss) the pirate captain was instead a politician. If he could not deliver, his crew could vote him out, kill him, or simply abandon his ship for another.

[@dannyh8517]

Does anyone know when these videos were recorded?

[@jamesosborne2305]

1991 I believe

[@user-ce2le8ml9y]

Where did the non-aggression principle originate??

[@Rico-Suave_]

Watched all of it 41:47

[@nikagarcia5223]

Very educational. I enjoyed it.

[@michaelprenez-isbell8672]

I'm looking forward to his talk on Goulding :-)

[@lumberpilot]

You judge a tree by its fruit.

[@aagamjain1395]

But you can also judge it by its seed

[@surenmartirosyan1819]

Can you please post Dr. Staloff’s Nietzche lecture

[@JulioLopez-xz5kx]

2 lectures have been uploaded.

[@PhilosoFeed]

Clicked immediately for the sh*t-eating grin of this OG in the thumbnail 👍🏼

[@christinemartin63]

Thank you, thank you, thank you! Literature, poetry, even music are more revealing than philosophy.

[@pearz420]

Then why has society become so philosophically-retarded despite having more of all that than at any point in recorded history?

[@hakus4600]

The recording quality is hellish but I do appreciate the content

[@Zandonus]

So.. It's 2024. AI is prompted to make a hit country song "Glue balloons" which is essentially about getting your privates stuck in a door. And it sounds pretty good. For an AI song. When will the songs about picking up after your dog and returning your cart come out?

[@paulmaupin7570]

Bob Odenkirk sure looks young in this movie!

[@Sunfried1]

Hume is not my cup of tea. Our duties are those moral reasons that bind us even when we lack the passion to obey them.

[@markoslavicek]

Couldn't we subscribe this to misuse of morality? Take, for example, a systematic demonisation of anything bodily (and to further extent, women as embodiment of it) in Christianity. Sexuality is natural but certain moral systems develop such "duties" and repress it. Obviously many things can be exploited, morality included, but I don't know if that was Hume's point in the first place. Correct me if I'm wrong, of course.

[@markoslavicek]

​@J J I guess we judge it by another moral standard :) Good point, I'm not quite sure where I'm heading with this. Your comment obviously distinguishes moral duties and moral reasons. My point would be that whether or not we have passion for any of them is subjective. I used the example of sexual repression which may bind us to obey/respect but how we feel about them is another level of debate. But feel free to challenge that and elaborate on your perspective, I'd be happy to consider it.

[@tangerinesarebetterthanora7060]

The Nazi prison guards were doing their duty.

[@MMG-q1v]

How did morality arise? I suggest it arose by the same mechanisms as every other trait of humans: by random mutation acted upon by natural selection. Our success as a species is attributable to our unique social biology. Those human societies that behaved in accordance with the forces that support what we call morality survived. Those that did not gradually , sometimes possibly suddenly, passed without leaving descendants.

[@truthisaquestion]

Ahh. The old “evolution of the gaps” story.

[@truthisaquestion]

@@MMG-q1v unsupported claim based on personal bias. Clearly you missed the point of the lecture and you likely have not read the source material. You just want to spread your unsubstantiated opinion which is based on your atheistic world view.

[@MMG-q1v]

@@truthisaquestion You’ve been saying that since 1759.

[@truthisaquestion]

@@MMG-q1v you’ve been saying nonsense and lies from the beginning of time

[@MMG-q1v]

@@truthisaquestion my daddy can beat up your daddy

[@subi_legacy]

this guy is a real nerd.

[@marcokite]

this guy ROCKS!

[@subi_legacy]

@@marcokite ok

[@joehosken3938]

@@subi_legacy​ I know right? This guy is the real-deal. It's sometimes hard to find the genuine article, but when you do..... ahhh it's worth it 😇 Only other nerds like me would understand.

[@subi_legacy]

@@Sub2meifurgay very aware of my nerdiness

[@liyah-c7p]

Ako lang ata Filipino na nanonood nito haha

[@zootjitsu6767]

19:31 press X to doubt.jpg

[@pearz420]

This, to me, is the most boring part of intellectual history - when upper class intellectuals really believed that most people were either like them or would be like them if given the opportunity. The bright-eyed naivete of the Enlightenment gives way to the hubris of late adolescence, like when you were 17-25 and thought you had it all figured out already. Fortunately, Nietzsche and Kierkegaard come in clutch later and make things interesting

[@HelenBrown-s1j]

Brown Daniel Hall Deborah Johnson William

[@Spl1nter699]

Lol the Disney series “Loki” (2022) is a theatrical manifestation of this speech.

[@AnthonyLongboarding]

Cringe comment

[@Spl1nter699]

@@AnthonyLongboarding the point is, even Hollywood utilizes Christian moral for their pop culture. Even if they twist it to glorify a Lucifer archetype.

[@pearz420]

teaching you to read and write was such a waste

[@zootjitsu6767]

How was napoleon evil? Seems like a swell dude. History is written by the British

[@thegrunbeld6876]

Damn, Hume was so woke before it was cool